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HTC Reportedly Hires Samsung’s Former Head of Marketing, Hopes to Communicate With Customers Better

According to a report out of Bloomberg, HTC has scooped Samsung’s former Head of Marketing, Paul Goldman, who has been hired on through a three month contract. Goldman has already been attending meetings for the company. HTC’s chairman Cher Wang states, “We just have to communicate well with our customers. I believe if we can communicate better, we will do better.”

Goldman worked for Samsung from 2008 through 2012, and played a key role when the company launched its now insanely-popular Galaxy brand around the globe. HTC sent a note out to Bloomberg, stating the company will continue to invest in talent and recruitment as “part of our broader human resources strategy.”

Forgive me, but let’s be frank. When a chairman of a company says we need to communicate better, then continues to green light a commercial of Gary Oldman going, “Blah blah blah, blah blah blah – go ask the Internet,” I think you might be in trouble.

Samsung is no joke when it comes to launching brands, then making them global phenomenons. We shall see if Goldman can sprinkle a bit of pixie dust on HTC.

IF the HTC pinheads were really “serious” thay would have hired this rain maker 6 months ago..too late.. IMO. Sam will wring their neck as far as public (retail) perception goes..with Apple a close 2nd…WHAT They paid Downy..old-ham..wow.

WitnessG

So you are telling me that blah blah blah isn’t good marketing. It communicates their ideas so well. /s

Higher_Ground

Hipster Troll Carwash.
I’ll never be able to remember what HTC really stands for again.
But that latest commercial is terrible. It’s one where maybe the first time you watch it you think it’s interesting, but by the 2nd time it rolls around you already hate it.

Cael

I never did and still don’t really know what HTC means but I know quietly brilliant which they got rid of. FAIL

joejoe5709

Eh… That era of Samsung was better at bashing Apple than it was highlighting its own products. The market has changed and advertising Android has changed. I hope this guy understands that. And yeah I cringe every single time I see that HTC ad. Even my wife said, “So… tell us nothing except do your own research?! That’s so bad. You can barely tell this even about cell phones.” And I couldn’t agree more.

flosserelli

“…to Communicate With Customers Better”

They can’t possibly do any worse.

Cael

They could hire Oprah and her commercial will be like: YOU GO BUY HTC AND YOU GO BUY HTC.
Or they could hire Lindsay Lohan.

Arty McBert

This is a good sign that HTC finally wants to become a serious contender. Because honestly, they could have hired me for millions less and I’d be able to produce much better commercials. And that’s not really saying much.

TSY87

As long as they don’t resort to cramming in useless gimmicks to sell their phones… okay, the ultrapixel already counts as one, but beside that, I think HTC makes a good product. Their phones feel premium, boom sound is legit (i think they need to market this more), and performance is right up there with the rest of the top tier phones.

P3droid

No matter whom HTC hires it is not about the message it is about the volume of the message. Samsung outspends HTC 100000:1 (<- groos exaggeration) in advertising world wide. So unless HTC has a great uncle who left them Billions of advertising dollars this isn't going to matter.

jnt

This, times 1000. It’s about having the customer walk in the store with HTC on the brain and not knowing why it’s there.

Sammy Sucks

This article is fully biased, I hate these types of article because it reeks of opinion and not true fact.

calculatorwatch

LOLwut?

BillySuede

you forgot the /s

joejoe5709

Facts: HTC sales are down and Samsung is so huge it’s practically the defacto OEM as far as the mainstream is concerned. You can’t tell me effective marketing wasn’t a massive part of building that empire.

notTheNarratorOrFryOrWhoever

Facts: Before the whole “It is only because of advertising” and “WOW A PHONE MADE OF PLASTIC!?” comments there was the Galaxy S2 (interestingly enough, has a better camera than the M8 and it came out in 2011). A highly rated and purchased (40 million) phone. This was then followed up with a little known phone called the Galaxy S3, which had 9 million preorders (eventually 50 million sold).

Pretty soon, people started talking about how awesome their commercials were, taking on Apple head on. Samsung would then become our only hope against the iMenace.

Later, The Narrator and his cronies would spout nonsense about the company who Android owes it success, causing even HTC to believe that everything Samsung has done is bad and they didn’t actually make phones that were once said to be “the best Android smartphone yet” and “possibly the best smartphone, period.” -Engadget.

Some of us remember the time before The Narrator’s crusade against polymers and successful marketing strategy. We had the Razr when it was a flip phone. But for those who were born after, and the Razr being a bloated brick with fake carbon fiber is the only Razr they know, those children believe Samsung is the evil empire who wants to destroy Android.

But the fact is, they were the ones who saved it.

joejoe5709

I’m so confused. There’s a lot of personal opinion in your “facts” and you’re all over the place with flip-phones and “bloated” RAZR’s. You’re saying “The Narrator and his cronies” single handedly took Samsung down a few notches? Wow where was I when that happened? I remember a few articles a year or so ago about Samsung’s dominance and some tinfoil hat sensationalist speculation about that slippery slope. I don’t think the general tech community, let alone the mainstream, still thinks of Samsung as “evil”. They are definitely the top dog (which is recognized primarily by the mainstream these days) and they’ve got a giant bullseye because of it, but that’s something else entirely. Samsung certainly is the biggest target for Apple users because Samsung put themselves in that position, not the tech community or even the public. In this respect, Samsung placed itself as the anti-Apple in a perfect timeframe when Apple was just starting to get boring and therefore became the most prominent Android brand as new smartphone users gravitated toward this movement and the first wave of Apple defectors started looking for other options. This also had a lot to do with Apple’s lawsuits and the grudge match between the two, but most of all it was a genius marketing campaign executed with speed and surgical precision to cut deep into Apple’s reign. But it was the persistent and effective marketing that made Samsung so synonymous with Android.

You’re absolutely right, though. It wasn’t just marketing. Marketing alone can’t polish a turd. Samsung made products that were nearly universally loved. And this didn’t just start with smartphones. LG and Samsung were major players in the pre-smartphone craze era when “feature phones” were all the rage and smartphones were stuffy business phone that were only good for email on the go. It takes not only good marketing but good product to make record sales. Just ask Motorola. Their marketing campaign was decent, the reviews were positive, but the Moto X just didn’t have the oomph and the panache to compete with Samsung. LG’s G2 had specs that meet or beat the S4, but their marketing sucked. You need both. It’s only recently that the likes of LG and Motorola are catching up with Samsung’s beloved status among reviewers. If they can throw some serious money into marketing and a showstopping flagship, they’ll start to turn the tides. I guarantee it. LG in particular seems to be playing Samsung’s game right back to them. They got the Nexus deal, they got the specs, their phones perform similarly so they’ve got the reviews, and they’re trying new ideas that grab headlines. I wouldn’t say Samsung is slipping in any way, but they are getting “boring” or running out of ideas like Apple did in 2010/2011. LG’s got a foundation laid and now just need to knock it out of the park. It’s still going to take a couple years to get to Samsung’s level, but they can do it. Motorola just needs to focus on earning our respect back especially after the Lenovo deal and keep the good buzz going. Then throw out something that will blow our minds and make sure everyone knows about it. Morotola makes great stuff but they seem to get overshadowed but other brands. I think a Motorola Nexus with the next major Android release is a necessary move, but that’s just me. And make sure it comes to Verizon this time.

Blue Sun

I do not own or particularly care for Samsung devices. That being said, I think they do an amazing job showing real world examples of how their phones (& software) can excel in their commercials. The commercials that came out during the S4 promotion really helped sell the device. HTC flat out flopped on showing any technical edge their devices have with RDJ & continue to do so with Gary Oldman.

calculatorwatch

I agree, the features Samsung shows off might be gimmicky, but they definitely help sell the device.

It’s funny how the teaser commercials for the new One were all about the features but never actually advertised the new phone. Then they change their strategy completely and go with Gary Oldman… jeez

rawr

Marketing in other companies all try to get the Old Spice level of viral video. It works for Old Spice because they are selling a deodorant that only has really one or two features so they have the freedom to have mom music videos, muscle men, and men on horses. When you are selling a phone with lots of features (and for the price of about 100+ Old Spice deodorants, but Old Spice doesn’t have a contract) you need to focus on the device and less on trying to make people go “oh did you see those trolls washing that car, or Gary Oldman saying blah over and over?”.

Or maybe HTC is just really bad at both kinds of commercials, ones that show features or ones that get people talking.

Oh and also bad at phones, but allegedly marketing is the only thing that sells phones these days right The Narrator?

The Narrator

just don’t switch to plastic

eee

Look down at your hand. What are you holding? It is the plastic LG G2. Now back up at me, laughing at your hypocrisy.

I’m on the internet.

The Narrator

I’m not talking about LG. am I?

Troll elsewhere.

jo

You have a plastic G2 and make fun of Samsung for plastic…

michael arazan

Just get rid of sense and keep the camera software, or make it better, and I’ll buy that one tomorrow

Cael

Good for them since they can’t respond to a simple email.

Malia Obama

SD cards, removable batteries, vanilla Android, some ads about the phone and not the name of the company, and accessories. HTC would be blown away by how their phones would instantly start selling.

snobrdr2324

Disagree with Vanilla android and to some extent removable batteries, everything else I agree with. I personally don’t like vanilla android when compared to Sense so I think selling both options on contract would be a great idea. I would be able to enjoy Sense and the people who like Vanilla android can buy a GPE on a discount. I would like removable batteries also but it isn’t a deal breaker. I wouldn’t take the S5 over the M8 because it has a removable battery and sacrifice the metal body and have to deal with Touchwiz.

BillySuede

outside of the tech community, no one knows or cares about vanilla android. that’s not the selling point you want to go with.

Sammy Sucks

There’s a Google play edition of the HTC one phones, the m8 has a sd card slot, and removable batteries are useless.

TSY87

I use to be dead set on my stance of removable batteries due to my experience with the galaxy nexus… now I dont mind either way since my s4 and note 3 have been decent on battery life.

rawr

I use to swap batteries all the time with my gnex, now I just always have it plugged into a wall. It is kinda like the old corded phones. Nostalgic.

TSY87

so retro… hahaha

Higher_Ground

yep, it’s basically a carphone now

Cael

Removable batteries would not hurt HTC since they always use huge batteries of small capacities.

crazysamz

they’ve basically done that. The M8 has an SD card slot. They have the Google Play edition model. They have some ads (although mediocre) about the M8. They only didn’t add removable batteries, which to us techies is huge, but for everyone else it’s almost the norm. They even make awesome accessories for the One, the new dot case is cool and more innovative than just a blatant rip-off like LG’s G2 flip cases

I work in a Cell Phone store for Verizon, most people have motorolas or iPhones with glued batteries and don’t really care. It’s not a dealbreaker for most.

For me and most tech geeks, of course it can be. I carry 3 batteries for my note 3.

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